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The
Labor Prosecutor’s Office launched an investigation in 2019
after obtaining extensive documentation from a local priest who
had tracked the case for decades. Following further inquiries
and witness testimony, prosecutors formally charged Volkswagen
in 2024.
The court accepted the charges that hundreds of workers were
subjected to degrading conditions between 1974 and 1986 at a
farm in Para state, owned by Volkswagen through a subsidiary.
The farm was used for cattle ranching and logging.
According to court filings, about 300 workers were hired under
irregular contracts to clear the forest and prepare pastures.
They were monitored by armed guards, lived in precarious
housing, received insufficient food and were forced to stay on
the farm under a system of debt bondage. No medical care was
provided, even to those who contracted malaria.
“These practices constituted one of the largest cases of slave
labor exploitation in Brazil’s recent history,” the Labor
Prosecutor’s Office said in a statement.
In his ruling, Judge Otavio Bruno da Silva Ferreira said
evidence confirmed the farm belonged to Volkswagen and that
conditions met the legal definition of slave labor.
“Slavery is a ‘present past,’ because its marks remain in
Brazilian society, especially in labor relations,” Ferreira
wrote. He added that the legacy of Brazil’s colonial slave
system continues to shape social structures and that recovering
this memory is essential to understanding current realities and
guiding antidiscrimination judgments.
Volkswagen’s Brazilian headquarters said in a statement it will
appeal the decision. The company said that in its 72 years of
operation in Brazil, it has “consistently defended the
principles of human dignity and strictly complied with all
applicable labor laws and regulations.”
“Volkswagen reaffirms its unwavering commitment to social
responsibility, which is intrinsically linked to its conduct as
a legal entity and employer,” the company said.
Brazil enslaved more people from Africa than any other country,
according to estimates from the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade
database. It was the last country in the Western Hemisphere to
abolish slavery, in 1888.
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